


sometimes what you’re looking for comes when you’re not looking at all

by cosmicocean



Category: Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (TV 2016)
Genre: AU, Angst, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Gen or Pre-Slash, M/M, Not Canon Compliant, Not entirely anyway, Pre-Slash, Season/Series 02, but it's like... really light pre-slash y'all, honestly i wrote it as pre-slash so i put that as the tag, so don't come in expecting real relationship building stuff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-29
Updated: 2018-12-29
Packaged: 2019-09-29 15:36:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17206097
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cosmicocean/pseuds/cosmicocean
Summary: Dirk’s having too hard a time seeing, so he closes his eyes. In just a moment he’s going to need to get walking, but right now he takes the moment. He tilts his face up towards the sun and breathes in the air. Slowly, he smiles.Then he’s suddenly grabbed by the shoulders and propelled forwards at a rather surprising speed.“Hey-“ he opens his eyes but the light’s still far too bright, far too much to see, before it becomes immaterial, as he is shoved in a small compartment and the light disappears.An AU of how season two might have started, written before season two ACTUALLY started.





	sometimes what you’re looking for comes when you’re not looking at all

**Author's Note:**

> I tagged this as non-canon compliant, but really, that is only barely true. It's less an alternative universe and more an alternative beginning.

Dirk is being escorted back to his cell when the guard escorting him gets a call on his radio.

“The director wants to see us both.” Dirk thinks it’s Doctor Schmidt. “He’s throwing a hissy fit about something again.”

The personnel have stopped even pretending to keep their mouths shut about their disdain for Friedkin around the projects. The guard groans a little.

“Get in there,” he tells Dirk and Dirk obliges. He shuts the door.

But the door shutting doesn’t sound quite right. He’s heard the door shutting a lot in the past five months, and he’s learned what it sounds like. He creeps up to the door and he intends to press his ear up against it, but when he does, it slowly swings open. The guard must not have closed it properly in his frustration with Friedkin.

Dirk tentatively steps into the hallway, looking around. It’s completely empty, the cold grayish blue corridor not even containing a sound.

The universe tugs at him and suddenly, he _knows_.

He walks down the corridor to the right. It seems like the thing to do.

 

The universe keeps pulling him left and right and to the side and straight ahead, and Dirk thinks perhaps that he’s supposed to be escaping. This should be probably a joyful thought, but he keeps thinking about the others. He _wants_ to escape, wants out of this hellhole more than anything, and the other projects don’t seem to like him very much anyway. But they’re still all in this boat together, and the only one who’s tried to kill him is Bart and she apologized (or as close as Bart gets to apologizing anyway, a “I’m glad the universe changed it’s mind or whatever”). It doesn’t feel right, leaving them all behind, and that’s probably what distracts him to the point where he almost runs into Bart when he turns a corner.

Dirk yelps and skitters back. Bart jumps and raises her gun until she sees who it is and puts it back down.

“Jesus, Dirk, scared the shit out of me.”

Dirk’s hand is still clasped over his heart. “The feeling is mutual.” He manages to force his voice down a couple octaves. “How did you get out?”

She shrugs.

“My guards had to die all of the sudden,” she answers. “Got it done pretty quietly. You’re like the sixth project I’ve run into.”

Dirk feels a slight tick of hope. “Really?”

“Yeah. Everyone’s been pretty quiet.”

Dirk looks around. He doesn’t see anyone, but he believes her.

“Mass exodus,” he murmurs. “Universe prompted.”

“Call it a hunch,” he and Bart say at the same time. Dirk smiles.

“Good luck finding Ken,” he says.

“Thanks. Good luck finding your weird two.”

“Thanks.”

They creep off down the corridors to their separate ways. Dirk feeling both fairly confident they’ll see each other again and a lot better about escaping.

 

Dirk’s step falters when he sees the doors that he knows are the ones that lead outside, the last pair between him and fresh air.

Those are them. They’re right there.

_He’s_ right there.

One step becomes two becomes three becomes a jog becomes a run becomes the world is suddenly overwhelmingly bright and the air tastes a whole lot cleaner and the doors are behind him.

Dirk’s having too hard a time seeing, so he closes his eyes. In just a moment he’s going to need to get walking, but right now he takes the moment. He tilts his face up towards the sun and breathes in the air. Slowly, he smiles.

Then he’s suddenly grabbed by the shoulders and propelled forwards at a rather surprising speed.

“Hey-“ he opens his eyes but the light’s still far too bright, far too much to see, before it becomes immaterial, as he is shoved in a small compartment and the light disappears.

 

Car boot.

It’s the only thing that makes sense. What Dirk’s in is mobile and can see cracks of light through where the door is, and it’s not being shunted back into the base light, it’s real light, which means he’s being transported. Car boot.

Is he the only one who got grabbed? Did everyone else make it out? He hopes someone else did. Someone should have made it out. Someone should be free of that place right now.

Although he supposes he’s going to be free, technically. If they’re not taking him back to the base, he’s being punished somewhere else. And the only reason it would make sense for him to be punished somewhere else is if it’s more convenient for them to leave a body out somewhere else to be buried, or perhaps dumped in a ditch. Whatever they’re about to do with him, he’s certain he won’t survive it.

Dirk’s fists are clenched. He’s not going to cry. He’s not going to give them the satisfaction. Up until they point at him whatever they use to kill him, then he’s sure he’ll break down, but he’s not going to cry on the way there.

He doesn’t get to see Farah again.

Or Amanda.

He doesn’t get to see Todd.

Dirk takes a deep breath, squeezing his eyes shut.

The universe led him outside.

He always knew it would be a tug from the universe that got him killed.

His fists tighten.

 

Eventually, the car starts slowing down. Dirk strains to hear, but he gets nothing other than a very muffled “here, here, turn here”. He wouldn’t want to hear how they’re planning on killing him anyway (there’s no way he can think to combat whatever they throw at him, he’s in bad physical shape and he’s never been very good at fighting even when he wasn’t), but the suspense is a hell of a thing to have struggle with before he dies. The car lurches to the side abruptly and Dirk is shunted into a wall.

“Ow,” he mutters as the car grinds to a halt. He thinks he can catch a muffled footstep or two, certainly the sound of car doors slamming shut (he can feel the impact of those, too).

Suddenly, the side is yanked out from next to him and Dirk tumbles out of the car, spinning until he’s lying flat down on the ground. It’s a field, he can tell that much by the dirt and the grass in front of his face.

He doesn’t get up. He’s not going to cooperate with them in his last moments. If it inconveniences them slightly to have to haul him up when they kill him, good.

Everything’s quiet for a couple moments and he’s waiting in as much gritted teeth defiance as he can pull off until he hears a whisper that suddenly rocks all of that off its hinges.

“Is he okay?”

Dirk can only just begin to process that this uncertain voice sounds just like Todd when one that sounds exactly like Farah whispers back “I don’t know. Should we poke him? We could poke him.”

“What if it hurts him worse?”

“I don’t know, but I don’t know how many options we have.” 

Dirk’s entire body aches and for once, it is the sort of ache that is both nothing like and eclipses the ache of testing. It sounds just like them. Is it possible that it’s them? Did they _actually_ come for him? He knows he dreamt about it often enough and he thought it was real then, but it feels not like that this time. Feels real real. There’s only one way to be sure.

“Is it safe to assume,” he says tentatively, still lying on the ground. “That you two are _not_ Blackwing agents that took me out here to kill me and dispose of my body for escaping?”  
Pause.

“Oh.” Todd’s voice sounds a little strangled

“Ah.” Farah’s sounds guilty. “Yes. I could see where there could be some confusion. Misleading.”

Dirk slowly gets to his feet. He brushes some of the dirt and grass off his jumpsuit (if he’s really seeing them again for the first time in months, he’d like to look as close to his best as he can get) and faces them.

Todd has less hair on his face and some green rug monstrosity hanging off of him. Farah’s got a hat over hers. Dirk can’t imagine what he looks like to them. They’re all silent.

“I dreamt before of you coming to get me,” Dirk says finally. “So I’m trying to appraise the situation and see if that’s what’s going on right now.”

Appraise is, Dirk thinks, a good word. His adrenaline is still pumping and neurons are firing every which way. Appraise is a nice, distracty word from that.

“What’s the verdict?” Farah asks. Todd doesn’t say anything, just stares at Dirk with wide eyes, like he’s the most surprising thing he’s ever seen. Dirk would point out that Todd’s not the one who just got transported very unexpectedly in the back of a car boot, but there’s something else in Todd’s staring that looks pleased.

“More likely than not. We never made it out of my room before, and this was most nights, so I know the likelihood. Also you were never dressed like-“ Dirk vaguely wiggles a hand at Todd. “That. I mean, Farah, you look lovely, of course, but Todd, what are you _wearing?_ ”

Todd blinks, eyes getting bigger. Dirk continues.

“Listen, I’m sure you look wonderful in a great many things, but ponchos that aren’t even your color? You look ridiculous. What _happened_ to you while I was gone?”

Todd doesn’t say anything, still staring. Dirk starts feeling nervous, like perhaps the best of his options wasn’t to start shit talking his best friend the second he saw him again.

Then, suddenly, Todd begins giggling.

“You can talk,” he says. Farah’s looking at him like he’s gone a bit insane. “You look like an extra escaped from a dystopian movie.”

It’s Dirk’s turn to stare at him.

Then he starts giggling too, at the same time as Farah, who closes the small distance between them and hugs him tightly.

“I’m glad you’re back,” she tells him.

“Me too,” he agrees as she pulls away. He straightens her cap for her and she grins.

As soon as Farah steps back, Dirk is intending to see if Todd would be willing to give him a hug when Todd flies at him. Dirk staggers a little when he catches him, the two of them back to laughing, and that’s when he knows. This is real, this is Farah, this is Todd, they are here, which is only making him laugh harder, both he and Todd jumping up and down a little as they let go of each other.

Eventually all three of them wind down a little, Dirk having to wipe his eyes a bit from all the laughing. Todd reaches out and punches him in the arm. It feels a lot friendlier than it did the last time.

“Missed you,” he mumbles. Dirk beams, feeling warm.

“Missed you, too.”

Todd ducks his head with a smile.

Dirk hears police sirens in the distance. He glances behind him to see flashing lights from very far off.

“Oh _shit_ ,” Farah mutters. Dirk looks back to see that just by going by their faces, the two of them clearly know whatever this means.

“It’ll be okay.” Todd sounds confident. “We’re going to be fine. We’ve got Dirk back.”

Dirk’s heart feels too big for his chest. The cars look too close to try and outrun, so instead the three of them wait for them to come and to see what happens, all still smiling.

**Author's Note:**

> So, my computer is an ass at organizing things, and I am currently trying to find an entry for the gigantic DGHDA Priestverse Hannah and I are working on, which means trying to work in both Finder, Pages, and iCloud, which my Mac will randomly save to sometimes. While trying to find that entry (which I STILL haven't found, but I found the mass compilation document we have so even if I can't find the story I still have the whole saga), I found this story, which I both completely forgot existed and to post.
> 
> If memory serves, I wrote this after the season two trailers were coming out but before the season actually premiered. To be perfectly honest with you, I can't remember if Hannah and I wrote this together or if this was a one off on my own (I feel like I vaguely remember discussing some of the dialogue in this with her, but I also have a pretty weird memory), but statistically speaking, we probably DID write this together, so better safe than sorry :D
> 
> I still have a tumblr, though I don't update it extremely often! I'll let y'all know if I make the move to Pillowfort at any time. Here are the links to both my tumblr and Hannah's. We're both plugging away at the Priestverse, so expect updates from us ficwise at some point in the near future!
> 
> http://cosmicoceanfic.tumblr.com/
> 
> http://princessparadoxical.tumblr.com/


End file.
